After years of campaigning by a small minority of the
British
merchants, who had chafed under the rule of the Calcutta
government, the Straits Settlements became a crown colony
on April
1, 1867. Under the crown colony administration, the
governor ruled
with the assistance of executive and legislative councils.
The
Executive Council included the governor, the senior
military
official in the Straits Settlements, and six other senior
officials. The Legislative Council included the members of
the
Executive Council, the chief justice, and four nonofficial
members
nominated by the governor. The numbers of nonofficial
members and
Asian council members gradually increased through the
years.
Singapore dominated the Legislative Council, to the
annoyance of
Malacca and Penang.

By the 1870s, Singapore businessmen had considerable
interest
in the rubber, tin, gambier, and other products and
resources of
the Malay Peninsula. Conditions in the peninsula were
highly
unstable, however, marked by fighting between immigrants
and
traditional Malay authorities and rivalry among various
Chinese
secret societies. Singapore served as an entrepôt for the
resources
of the Malay Peninsula and, at the same time, the port of
debarkation for thousands of immigrant Chinese, Indians,
Indonesians, and Malays bound for the tin mines and rubber
plantations to the north. Some 250,000 Chinese alone
disembarked in
Singapore in 1912, most of them on their way to the Malay
states or
to the Dutch East Indies.

Although most Chinese immigrants merely passed through
Singapore, the Chinese population of the island grew
rapidly, from
34,000 in 1878 to 103,000 in 1888. The colonial government
established the Chinese Protectorate in 1877 to deal with
the
serious abuses of the labor trade. William Pickering, the
first
appointed Protector of Chinese, was the first British
official in
Singapore who could speak and read Chinese. Pickering was
given
power to board incoming ships and did much to protect the
newly
arrived immigrants. In the early 1880s, he also extended
his
protection to Chinese women entering the colony by working
to end
forced prostitution. Because of his sympathetic approach
and
administrative ability, the protector soon spread his
influence and
protection over the whole Chinese community, providing
arbitration
of labor, financial, and domestic disagreements, thereby
undermining some of the powers of the secret societies.
Although no
longer able to engage in illegal immigration practices,
the
societies continued to cause problems by running illegal
gambling
houses and supporting large-scale riots that often
paralyzed the
city. In 1889, Governor Sir Cecil Clementi-Smith sponsored
a law to
ban secret societies, which took effect the following
year. The
result was to drive the societies underground, where many
of them
degenerated into general lawlessness, engaging in
extortion,
gambling operations, gang fights, and robbery. The power
of the
secret societies, however, was broken.

The largest Chinese dialect group in the late
nineteenth
century were the Hokkien, who were traditionally involved
in trade,
shipping, banking, and industry. The next largest group,
the
Teochiu, engaged in agricultural production and
processing,
including gambier, pepper, and rubber production, rice and
lumber
milling, pineapple canning, and fish processing. Cantonese
served
as artisans and laborers and a few made their fortunes in
tin. The
two smallest groups, the Hakka and Hainanese, were mostly
servants,
sailors, or unskilled laborers. Because wealth was the key
to
leadership and social standing within the Chinese
community at that
time, the Hokkien dominated organizations such as the
Singapore
Chinese Chamber of Commerce and supplied most of the
Chinese
members of the Legislative Council and the Chinese
Advisory Board.
The latter, established in 1889 to provide a formal link
between
the British government of the colony and the Chinese
community,
served as a place to air grievances but had no power.

The affluent among Singapore's Chinese community
increasingly
saw their prosperity and fortunes tied to those of the
crown colony
and the British Empire. Western education, customs, and
pastimes
were adopted, and the sons of Chinese businessmen were
often sent
to Britain for university training. The Straits Chinese
British
Association was formed in 1900 by Baba Chinese leaders to
promote
loyalty to the British Empire as well as to advance the
education
and welfare of Singapore's Chinese. Visiting British
royalty were
warmly received and British causes and victories
enthusiastically
supported. The
Straits Chinese (see Glossary)
contributed
generously to the British war effort in World War I.

Although the Chinese upper class, particularly the
Straits-born
Chinese, grew increasingly Westernized, the homeland
exerted a
continuing pull on its loyalties that increased during
this period.
Visits to China by Singapore Chinese became more common
with the
advent of steamship travel. The relaxation by the 1870s of
China's
law forbidding emigration (repealed in 1893) and the
protection
afforded Singaporeans by British citizenship made it
relatively
safe for prosperous businessmen to visit their homeland
and return
again to Singapore. Upper-class Singapore Chinese
frequently sent
their sons to school in China and encouraged them to find
brides
there, although they themselves had often married local
women.

In the latter part of the nineteenth century, China's
ruling
Qing dynasty began to take an interest in the Nanyang
Chinese and
sought to attract their loyalty and wealth to the service
of the
homeland. Chinese consulates were established in
Singapore, Malaya,
the Dutch East Indies, and other parts of the Nanyang.
Whampoa was
appointed Singapore's first consul in 1877. He and his
successors
worked diligently to strengthen the cultural ties of the
Singapore
Chinese to China by establishing a cultural club, a
debating
society, Singapore's first Chinese--language newspaper
(Lat
Pau), and various Chinese-language schools, in which
the medium
of instruction was Chinese. One of the most important
functions of
the consul, however, was to raise money for flood and
famine relief
in China and for the general support of the Qing
government. With
the upheaval in China following the Hundred Days' Reform
Movement
in 1898, and its suppression by the Qing conservatives,
the
Singapore Chinese and their pocketbooks were wooed by
reformists,
royalists, and revolutionaries alike. Sun Yat-sen founded
a
Singapore branch of the Tongmeng Hui, the forerunner of
the
Guomindang (Kuomintang--Chinese Nationalist Party), in
1906. Not
until the successful Wuchang Uprising of 1911, however,
did Sun
receive the enthusiastic support of Singapore Chinese.

Much smaller than the Chinese community and less
organized in
the late nineteenth century was the Singapore Indian
community. By
1880 there were only 12,000 Indians, including Hindus,
Muslims,
Sikhs, and Christians, each group with its own temple,
mosque, or
church. South Indians tended to be shopkeepers or
laborers,
particularly dockworkers, riverboatmen, and drivers of the
ox carts
that were the major transport for goods to and from the
port area.
North Indians were usually clerks, traders, and merchants.
Both
groups came to Singapore expecting to return to their
homeland and
were even more transient than the Chinese.

Malays continued to be drawn to Singapore from all over
the
archipelago, reaching a population of 36,000 by 1901.
Malay traders
and merchants lost out in the commercial competition with
Chinese
and Europeans, and most Malay immigrants became small
shopkeepers,
religious teachers, policemen, servants, or laborers. The
leadership positions in the Malay-Muslim community went to
the
Jawi-Peranakan, because of their facility in English, and
to
wealthy Arabs. In 1876 the first Malay-language newspaper
of the
region, Jawi Peranakan, was published in Singapore.
Several
other Malay-language journals supporting religious reform
were
begun in the early twentieth century, and Singapore became
a
regional focal point for the Islamic revival movement that
swept
the Muslim world at that time.

A number of events beginning in the late nineteenth
century
strengthened Singapore's position as a major port and
industrial
center. When the Suez Canal opened, the Strait of Malacca
became
the preferred route to East Asia. Steamships began
replacing
sailing ships, necessitating a chain of coaling stations,
including
Singapore. Most of the major European steamship companies
had
established offices in Singapore by the 1880s. The
expansion of
colonialism in Southeast Asia and the opening of Thailand
to trade
under King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) brought even more trade
to
Singapore. The spread of British influence in Malaya
increased the
flow of rubber, tin, copra, and sugar through the island
port, and
Singapore moved into processing and light manufacturing,
some of
which was located on its offshore islands. To serve the
growing
American canning industry a tin smelter was built in 1890
on Pulau
Brani (pulau means island). Rubber processing
expanded
rapidly in response to the demands of the young automobile
industry. Oil storage facilities established on Pulau
Bukum made it
the supply center for the region by 1902.

In the early twentieth century, Singapore had expanded
its
financial institutions, communications, and infrastructure
in order
to support its booming trade and industry. British banks
predominated, although by 1905 there were Indian,
Australian,
American, Chinese, and French-owned banks as well.
Telegraph
service from India and Europe reached Singapore in 1870,
and
telephone service within Singapore was installed in 1879
and
extended to Johore in 1882
(see Telecommunications
, ch.
3). The
more than sixty European-owned companies in the Straits
Settlements
crown colony in the 1870s were largely confined to
Singapore and
Penang. Far more prosperous were some of the Chinese firms
in
Singapore that were beginning to expand their business
links
throughout Asia.

Singapore's port facilities failed to keep up with its
commercial development until the publicly owned Tanjong
Pagar Dock
Board (renamed Singapore Harbour Board in 1913) set about
replacing
old wharves and warehouses and installing modern machinery
and a
new graving dock (dry dock). Trucks gradually replaced ox
carts for
transporting goods from the harbor to the town, and by
1909 it was
possible to travel from Singapore to Penang by train and
railroad
ferry. The Johore Causeway linked road and rail
transportation
between Singapore and the peninsula after 1923.

At the turn of the century, social advancement lagged
far
behind economic development in Singapore. While the
wealthy enjoyed
their social clubs, sports facilities, mansions, and
suburban
estates, the lower classes endured a grim existence marked
by
poverty, overcrowding, malnutrition, and disease. Malaria,
cholera,
and opium addiction were chiefly responsible for
Singapore's
mortality rate, which in 1896 was higher than that of Hong
Kong,
Ceylon, or India. A 1907 government commission to
investigate the
opium problem found that the majority of opium deaths were
among
the poor, who were reduced to smoking the dregs of used
opium.
Campaigns by missionaries and European-educated Chinese to
ban
opium use were successfully opposed by tax farmers and
businessmen.
By 1900 the opium tax provided one-half of the revenue of
the
colonial government, and both Asian and European
businessmen
resisted its replacement with an income tax. As an
alternative, the
government in 1910 took over all manufacture and sale of
opium,
setting up a factory at Pasir Panjang. Opium sales
continued to
constitute half of the government's revenue, but the most
dangerous
use of the drug had been curtailed.

Education was generally in a backward state. Most
primary
schools in which Malay, Chinese, or Tamil was the medium
of
instruction were of poor quality. English-language primary
schools
were mostly run by Christian missionaries, and the only
secondary
education was provided by Raffles Institution beginning in
1884. In
1902 the government formulated an Education Code, under
which it
took responsibility for providing English-language primary
schools;
the following year it took over Raffles Institution. With
the
support of the Chinese community, the government opened a
medical
school in 1905 that had a first class of twenty-three
students.
Upgraded to the King Edward Medical College in 1920, the
school
formed the cornerstone of the future Singapore University.
The
affluent of Singapore sent their children to the
English-language
schools, which had steadily improved their standards. The
brightest
students vied for the Queen's Scholarships, founded in
1889, which
provided for university education in Britain for Asian
students.
Many prosperous Asian families themselves sent their
children to
school in Britain. An English-language education at either
the
secondary or university level provided many Asians with
the key to
government, professional, or business employment. It also
created
a bond among the upper classes of all ethnic groups.

Under the leadership of reformist Chinese, Singapore's
Chinese-
language schools were also expanded and modernized at this
time. A
scientific curriculum was added to the traditional
education in
Chinese classics and Confucian morality. Students from
Chinese-
language schools often continued their education in China,
where a
school for Nanyang students had been opened in Nanjing in
1907 to
prepare them for a role in Singapore's Chinese community.
At the
turn of the century, schools were even established in
Singapore for
Chinese women, who before that time had led severely
cloistered
lives under the domination of their husbands and
mothers-in-law. By
1911 Chinese women were receiving instruction in Malay,
English,
Chinese, music, sewing, and cooking. Malay and
Tamil-language
primary schools continued to decline, and few students
were able to
progress from them to the English-language secondary
level.

Responsibility for Singapore's defense had been a
contentious
issue between London and Singapore almost since its
founding. The
Singapore merchants resisted any attempts to levy taxes
for
fortifications and even objected to paying the cost of
maintaining
a small garrison on this island. In 1886 troubles with
Russia over
Afghanistan and worry over the Russian navy in the
Pacific,
prompted the British to begin fortifying the port area and
building
new barracks and other military facilities. The Singapore
business
community resisted strenuously London's proposal to double
the
colony's annual military contribution, insisting that the
island
was a critical link in the imperial chain. The colony,
nonetheless,
was required to pay a larger sum although slightly less
than
originally demanded. The British signed a defensive treaty
with
Japan in 1902. The Japanese defeat of the Russian navy in
1905
removed that threat to Britain's seapower in Asia, thus
enabling
Britain to concentrate its navy in its home waters in
response to
a German naval buildup.

Singapore essentially sat out World War I. Fear that
the island
would be attacked by German; East Asiatic Squadron never
materialized. Singapore's German business community,
nonetheless,
was rounded up and interned comfortably at their Teutonia
Club. The
only incident of the war period was the mutiny of
Singapore's small
garrison, the 800 troops of the Fifth Light Infantry
Regiment. The
regiment, composed entirely of Punjabi Muslims, was
angered that
Britain was at war with Muslim Turkey. When the regiment
was
ordered to Hong Kong in February 1915, rumors spread
through the
unit that they were actually being sent to fight in France
or
Turkey. On the eve of its departure, the regiment
mutinied, killed
the officers, and terrorized the town. Within ten days the
rebellion had been put down by a combined force of the
Singapore
Volunteer Artillery (a unit of 450 volunteers formed in
1914),
police, Malay troops from Johore, the crews of British,
French,
Japanese, and Russian warships in port, and several
hundred
civilians. After the mutineers were rounded up, thirty-six
were
shot in public executions and the others were imprisoned
or sent on
active duty elsewhere. Subseqquently, hard feelings were
created in
Singapore's Indian community by a requirement that its
members
register with the government. A small British detachment
was
brought in to garrison the post for the rest of the war,
with the
aid of the Singapore Volunteer Artillery.